“Vivar was like many veterans of the French wars,” Bautista said sarcastically, “in his belief that the experience of fighting against Bonaparte’s armies prepared him for suppressing a rebellion in a country like Chile. But they are not the same kind of fighting! Would you say they were the same kind of fighting, Mister Sharpe?”
“No, sir.” Sharpe replied in all honesty, but even so he felt that he was somehow betraying his dead friend by agreeing.
Bautista, pleased to have elicited the agreement from Sharpe, smiled, then glanced at Harper’s bandaged head. “I hear you were sadly inconvenienced yesterday?”
Again Sharpe was surprised by the suddenness of the question, but he managed to nod. “Yes, sir.”
The smile grew broader as Bautista snapped his fingers. “I would not like you to return to England with an unhappy memory of Chile, or convinced that my administration is incompetent to police Valdivia’s alleys. So I am delighted to tell you, Mister Sharpe, that the thieves were apprehended and your effects recovered.” The click of his fingers had summoned two orderlies who each carried a bag into the room. The bags were placed on the table. “Come!” Bautista ordered. “Come and examine them! I wish to be assured that everything has been recovered. Please!”
Astonished, Sharpe and Harper walked to the table and, in front of the audience, unpacked the bags. Everything seemed to be there, but not in the same condition. Their clothes, which had been soiled and crumpled from the long sea voyage, had all been laundered and pressed. Their boots had been polished, and Sharpe did not doubt that their razors had been stropped to a murderous edge. “It’s all here,” he said, and thinking he had not been gracious enough, he made a clumsy half-bow to Bautista. “Thank you, Your Excellency.”
“Everything is there?” Bautista demanded. “Nothing is missing?”
It was then that Sharpe realized one thing was missing: the portrait of Napoleon. Harper’s small silver thimble, duly polished, was in one of the bags, but not the silver-framed portrait of the Emperor. Sharpe opened his mouth to report the loss, then abruptly closed it as he considered that the portrait’s absence could be a trap. Bautista was evidently obsessed with Napoleon, which made it very likely that the Captain-General had himself purloined the signed portrait. Nor, Sharpe decided, was the loss of the portrait important. It was a mere souvenir, as the French said, and Lieutenant Colonel Charles could always write and request another such keepsake. Sharpe also had a strong suspicion that if he mentioned the missing picture, Bautista might refuse to issue the travel permits and so, without considering the matter further, Sharpe shook his head. “Nothing is missing, Your Excellency.”
Bautista smiled as though Sharpe had said the right thing, then, still smiling, he clicked his fingers again, this time summoning a squad of infantrymen who escorted two prisoners. The prisoners, in drab brown clothes, had their wrists and ankles manacled. The chains scraped and jangled as the two men were forced to the room’s center.
“These are the thieves,” Bautista announced.
Sharpe stared at the two men. They were both black-haired, both had moustaches, and both were terrified. Sharpe tried to remember the face of the man who had aimed the carbine at him, and in his memory that man had sported a much bigger moustache than either of these prisoners, but he could not be certain.
“What do you do,” Bautista asked, “with thieves in your country?”
“Imprison them,” Sharpe said, “or maybe transport them to Australia.”
“How merciful! No wonder you still have thieves. In Chile we have better ways to deter scum.” Bautista turned to the fire, drew a big handkerchief from his uniform pocket, then wrapped the handkerchief around the metal handle of what Sharpe had supposed to be a long poker jammed into the basket grate. It was not a poker, but rather a branding iron. Bautista jerked it free of the coals and Sharpe saw the letter L, for ladron, glowing at its tip.
“No! Senar! No!” The nearest thief twisted back, but two soldiers gripped him hard by the arms, and a third stood behind the man to hold his head steady.